


Everything

by beranica



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 04:23:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11119854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beranica/pseuds/beranica
Summary: Betty is her everything, until one day she’s not.





	Everything

Betty is her everything, until one day she’s not. 

 

The finality comes when Veronica asked her over to talk about something important; her dad is coming home, and Veronica is terrified. But instead of Smithers letting her know that Betty’s here, she gets a phone call, “Jughead needs me,” Betty explains.

 

“I understand,” Veronica says, even though she doesn’t. _I need you_ , hangs on the tip of her tongue but she doesn’t have enough gall to say it as they say their goodbyes.

 

It happens like that a few more times before Veronica stops asking altogether.

 

* * *

 

Her whole life people have made assumptions on what kind of a life she led. They’d assumed that she is Daddy’s perfect little girl who could get anything if she bats her lashes, and playing along with that misconception was always easier than revealing the truth.

 

Her father has been home for a few days now, and Veronica hasn’t been able to breathe properly since he stepped foot in Riverdale.

 

Where her father might have joined them in a home that isn’t his, her mother has all but left. Her face isn’t genuine as she moves around the apartment every day, watering the plants and fixing their meals.

 

Veronica’s been doing everything to snap her mom out of the haze she’s been in ever since they’d received the news that the court ruled in favor of the Lodges. She’s run up her credit card twice, stayed out until two am more times than she can count, spoken ill about her father when he wasn’t around, but none if it has done anything to take away the glaze that keeps her mom’s eyes from focusing.

 

“Mom,” Veronica whispers across the dinner table when her father steps out to take a call. “Mom, _Mami_.”

 

Her eyes lift to Veronica’s as a sharp warning before they fall back down to the meal on her plate that she’s hardly touched.

 

Suddenly, Veronica feels like the food in her stomach is enough to make her sick. “I’m going to my room,” she whispers, rising from her seat, and brushing past her father as he comes back to join them.

 

Tears are pooling in her eyes and she struggles to figure out why. She grabs her phone and her fingers dance over Betty’s contact before she realizes what she’s doing. She wants Betty, she needs Betty, she fucking misses Betty.

 

In the end, she decides against calling her estranged best friend. What would she even say? 

 

_Hi, Betty! I know we haven’t spoken in a couple days but my mom looked at me funny, and now I’m on the verge of a breakdown._  Or maybe, _Hi, Betty! My life’s falling apart and you’re the only person who I thought to call._ Or, _Hi, Betty! You’re the first real friend I’ve ever had and now we don’t talk and I’m terrified I’ve fucked everything up._

 

Veronica falls asleep with her phone still opened on Betty’s contact.

 

* * *

 

Veronica doesn’t know how they ended up like this; making small talk. They sit in their third-period class together, waiting for the bell to ring. Veronica’s throat feels uncomfortably tight as Betty rambles on about the happenings of her life that Veronica is no longer a part of.

 

The pain of making small talk with Betty when they once would spill their lives out to each other is once she can’t bare. She puts on a smile that rivals the fabricated ones her mom has been wearing lately, and she decides she doesn’t want to have Betty anymore. Not like this.

 

Ironically, the smile Betty flashes her right when the bell rings looks a lot like her own.

 

* * *

 

 

Betty and Jughead break up, and Veronica finds out from Alice Cooper of all people. She calls her on a Thursday morning when school is canceled for the snow.

 

“She’s inconsolable,” Alice tells her over the phone. She sounds tired, yet concerned. It makes her ache for the mother her mom used to be. “Maybe you could try calling her?”

 

Veronica does try calling but her phone rings once before she’s sent to voicemail. Suddenly, Veronica’s inconsolable too.

 

* * *

 

“Veronica,” Betty says one day at lunch. The boys are still in line, getting their lunches, and the two of them are left with a rare moment alone. Their eyes meet, and a suffocating atmosphere soon settles in. “Are … you okay?”

 

Instinctually, Veronica’s hand raises to touch underneath her eye. It’s been hard to keep putting on makeup when the underneath her eyes are desperately darkening for help.

 

_No_ , she nearly says. _I’m not. I’m drowning, Betty, and you haven’t been around to help me breathe._

 

“Of course,” is just as good. “Are you?”

 

“Fine,” is Betty’s delayed response. It makes Veronica nauseous; Betty used to know when she was lying.

 

* * *

 

 

Things are the worst they’ve ever been with her father when Betty shows up on her doorstep, no warning from Smithers.

 

To be fair, he’s never laid a hand on them, but he yells, and he’s stripped away their independence, and his presence is suffocating. She never realized how good it felt to breathe until she realized her father wasn’t letting her.

 

Her mom is barely a person anymore. She cooks, cleans, and water the plants around the apartment. She’d come out of her shell so much when they’d first moved back to Riverdale, but that women is a stranger to them all now.

 

When he left, Veronica realized how much she’d become like him. That’s the reason that she’d sworn off how she’d climbed the social scene at Spencer; she won’t let her dad control her like that anymore.

 

Honestly, it felt so good when he was gone, and she felt so guilty for that. What kind of a daughter wishes for her father to stay in jail?

 

“Smithers,” she’d asked a long while ago when she was still coming to terms with everything, “is my father a good person?”

 

His answer, or lack thereof, was telling enough.

  
  
“Veronica.” Betty’s voice and glossy eyes draw her away from her thoughts. “I’m so sorry.”

  
  
But Veronica can’t breathe because her father is around the corner listening. If nothing else, Betty’s stayed safe from their separation. Even if it’s cost Veronica heartache.

  
  
So she bites back a sob that threatens to spill over and does what she has to. “It’s too late, Betty.”

  
  
Betty’s eyes, wet and wide, search Veronica’s desperately for that truth. “You don’t mean that. You can’t.”

  
  
“I do and I can,” Veronica says around a cracking voice. “Leave, Betty. We can’t do this anymore.”

  
  
Veronica closes the door before Betty can properly respond. For someone who’s hardly been her friend, the ache in her chest feels suspiciously like a breakup.

  
  
“What was that?” her father asks when she tries to retreat back to her room.

  
  
“Betty,” Veronica sighs, pushing past him before her tears start to fall.

 

* * *

 

Veronica’s best childhood memories were the ones where her father had to leave for business trips. Those were the times where she really got to know who her mom was outside of her dad. So when she hears that her dad is going back to New York for the week to take care of business, she’s ecstatic… until she realizes that her mom is going with him. The trust isn’t there yet, and Veronica’s sure he would take her too if she didn’t have school. But she does and he doesn’t, and she’s left alone in an apartment that doesn’t feel like home anymore.

 

There’s a knock.

 

She’s expecting Archie when she pulls back the door, Betty’s there and stepping into her apartment without an invitation inside.

 

It’s never been like Betty to give up.

 

Veronica shuts the door and turns to her warily. Where she expects a yelling match to ensue, Betty’s arms are suddenly wrapping around her body wordlessly; drawing her against Betty’s chest, her ear pressing against her thrumming heart.

  
  
Harbored emotions suddenly erupt in Veronica, in Betty’s arms. She can’t help gasping against her rapidly tightening throat as weeks of repressed feelings surface.

 

Veronica returns the embrace, wrapping her arms around Betty and burying her face into her soft blue sweater, her lip wobbling. Betty’s hair is free from its usual ponytail and brushes against her forehead, calming her and overwhelming her all at once.

 

“Betty,” she says thickly. It’s getting harder to swallow the sounds she struggles to keep quiet, harder to ward off the tears.

  
  
“Veronica, breathe,” Betty says, rubbing along her back. Veronica wonders if she’s breathing at all when she sucks in a deep breath of air that sounds like a sob.

  
  
The tears come before she can do anything to stop them.

  
  
Betty hugs her tighter, making soft shushing sounds. It’s the first time she’s been held since the last time Veronica dissolved. Oddly enough, that’d been done in Betty’s arms too and was also caused by her father.

  
  
Veronica composes herself enough to pull back from Betty’s chest and asks a question. “What about Jughead?”

  
  
Betty bites her lip. “He doesn’t matter anymore. You do.”

  
  
“Why?” Veronica whispers.

  
  
Betty’s hand traces her cheek and pushes dark hair behind Veronica’s ear. “We can talk about that later. I’ve got you right now, okay? I’m sorry for everything.”

 

Veronica settles back against Betty’s chest and listens to her heartbeat thrum. “I’m sorry too.”

 

It’s the first time in a long time where Betty is the girl she first met in Riverdale all those months ago. Though this feels like the beginning of something new, and a start to dealing with the demons she faces in the form of her father, something she knows she can’t do alone.

 

* * *

 

 

When Veronica wakes up the next morning, Betty has a protective arm slung around her waist. Veronica breathes out easily, presses closer into Betty’s side, and lets herself fall back asleep.

 

It feels foreign, being able to breath easier again, but she’s hopeful that it’ll become familiar (along with waking up in Betty’s arms) again soon.

**Author's Note:**

> beranica.tumblr.com


End file.
